


interlude: ostrava

by ere_the_sun_rises



Series: Esther on Ice [4]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Awkward Tension, European Figure Skating Championships, Jewish Identity, Other, Subtext
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-14
Updated: 2017-12-14
Packaged: 2019-02-14 19:13:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13014339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ere_the_sun_rises/pseuds/ere_the_sun_rises
Summary: Esther leaves her group behind at the European Championships, and is surprised when a certain Ice Tiger follows her out.





	interlude: ostrava

_You never realize how many of your friends aren’t European until you go to Europeans._

Esther Markowitz, Grand Prix Final gold medalist and Luxembourg national champion, pocketed her phone at another burst of raucous laughter from the other side of the table. She and Emanuel had flown out to Ostrava four days ago, and she’d spent nearly the entire plane ride wondering just what the hell she was supposed to do all week. It wasn’t like she didn’t _know_ anyone here—that was far from the truth, in fact—but everyone she would’ve considered a close friend in skating (anybody she wouldn’t feel weird about hitting up to hang out with, anyway) was gearing up for Four Continents, just a little less than three weeks out.

Oddly enough, the old, familiar worry she might’ve felt at being by herself had failed to reach her like it normally did. Her usual anxieties had been hitting her less effectively, ever since she’d started taking the medication she’d been prescribed right after the Final. It hadn’t been long at all, really; only six weeks, as a matter of fact, but the effects had been almost instantaneous. It was almost comical now, to think of how uncertain she’d been about it beforehand (but what _hadn’t_ she been uncertain about, really)—in short, her brain was working better than it had in…well, certainly longer than she could remember.

“You do seem sharper lately,” Emanuel had muttered, tapping appraisingly at his lip when she told him as much. That had been her coach speaking, already puzzling out what that meant for her skating, for her career. Then, he’d smiled warmly, caught her up in one of his crushing hugs. “I’m so happy for you, Esther.”

What that had meant for this week was that she hadn’t been afraid to shoot a message to Mila Babicheva, ask if she could take her up on one of her many insistences that they should hang out more. Her enthusiastic agreement had been surprising enough; stranger still had been the happy acceptance of her group—Sara Crispino and her brother, naturally; Emil, always wherever they were; Aileen, who, interestingly, seemed to have situated herself as a somewhat-permanent fixture; and a sullen Yuri Plisetsky, who seemed to have been dragged out by his rinkmate, against his protests.

(“I don’t want to tag along with you and your friends, hag,” he’d complained, when she’d brought him along with her to meet them in the hotel lobby.

“If I leave you in your room, you’ll look at cat videos and text your friend Otabek all day long,” she teased, prompting him to tell her to shut up and shoot a discrete, searching look at Esther. She pretended not to notice; that, and the sudden flush that showed rather quickly on his pale, pointed face.)

In spite of his complaints, he’d followed them out, trailed along as they drifted through downtown throughout the morning, and sat down with them when they finally chose a place for something that could’ve been a late lunch or an early dinner. None of them had an event that day, so they’d taken the opportunity to sightsee and relax—tomorrow, the men had their short program in the morning, and the ladies were finishing with their free skate in the evening.

“It’s probably going to be Esther.” She looked up at the sound of her name, found Mila looking at her from across the table, one arm slung easily around Sara’s shoulders. Yuri, too, peered up from his phone screen.

“I _know_ ,” Sara sighed. “Your program difficulty is ridiculous.”

Esther chuckled to fill the silence, still unsure of how to reply to compliments. “Nothing’s for certain. We won’t know until tomorrow.”

“Still,” said Mila, breezily. “I think it’s your year.”

 _Only if I make it,_ she thought, sipping at the last dregs of her water. Emil, thankfully, had been a model host—down to the recommendation of clubs that they could check out. Dinner was winding down; the check had already been delivered, and all they were doing now was figuring out where to go next.

“All right, guys, I think I’m gonna tap out.” Esther slid her phone back into her pocket, stood up and pushed her chair in. She waved through the chorus of goodbyes, promised to see them again in the next few days, and headed out the door.

 _The question is, where to now?_ She stopped just outside and took advantage of the better service to look again at her phone. She wasn’t ready to head back just yet—dusk was one of her favorite times to explore. _Maybe I can just walk back, and see what I see along the way._

The door opened again. To her surprise, it was Yuri Plisetsky that emerged, pulled his hood over his half-pony, and stopped next to her on the pavement. She half-expected him to keep walking, but he stayed where he was, thumbing through his Instagram feed.

“You had enough, too?”

“The hag and her girlfriend are almost as bad as Piggy and Viktor,” he groused.

Esther chuckled. “You think that was worse than how clueless Michele is? I swear Aileen could climb into his lap and he still wouldn’t have any idea.”

Yuri didn’t reply; eventually, he got tired of his phone and jammed it away, in favor of burying his hands deep in the front pockets of his hoodie—trimmed in leopard print, much like his phone case. She couldn’t recall if she’d ever seen him with _out_ some kind of animal print on him, in the few times they’d met.

In truth, the awkward silence that persisted between them was fairly demonstrative of their relationship. She heard plenty about Yuri, through Otabek—she would call them best friends with confidence—but her interactions with him had ranged from casual teenage apathy to full-on teenage disdain. He _was_ only fifteen, to be fair, but Nava was sixteen. No, Yuri had seemed like he had something against her from the beginning.

_I don’t know what you’ve got going through your head, but I’m not out to keep him from you. You know that, right? He likes you a lot. We don’t have to be best friends, but I’d like for us to both be in his life._

_It was a favor for a friend_. He still hadn’t moved; was staring, ostensibly, at whatever was across the street.

“I’m going to walk back,” she said, leaving the invitation unsaid—he was far from imperceptive, and somehow, she had a feeling he was more likely to take her up on it that way. Sure enough; she started walking, and after a moment, he followed.

He’d gotten taller, since Barcelona—just a little, but she remembered being at eye level with his nose a little while ago, and now she was looking at his mouth. _Maybe that’s what’s got him in such a foul mood._ Growth spurts could mean a death sentence for an entire season. Esther could still remember her parents crowing over how lucky she was to be an early bloomer; she’d gotten most of that out of the way in her Novice years, although her cup size hadn’t gotten the message until after she’d dropped out. She’d almost believe that was the case, if she didn’t know Yuri Plisetsky.

“How do you feel about tomorrow?” she asked. He shrugged. Esther stifled her sigh. After a moment, though, he yielded an actual answer.

“I haven’t been landing my quads as well.”

_Huh. I guess I’m safe to talk to. Non-competition and all._

“That sucks.” Sometimes there wasn’t anything better to do than acknowledge someone’s feelings.

Yuri didn’t reply—not that she’d expected him to. He didn’t seem that interested in holding up his end of a conversation. And yet, he continued to keep pace with her, just as he’d done with their group that whole day.

It hit her in a dizzying moment of clarity. He wasn’t inaccessible, for as much as he tried to be. Yuri Plisetsky was an open book, but so near to herself that she’d failed to see it at first: where she had taken her own loneliness and withdrawn, he paid it back in sharp words and feigned indifference.

 _Beka saw it, though. Yuri’s like us, that’s what he said._ He might as well have been saying _Yuri’s like you._

_So, Beka, it seems you have a type._

Esther gave Yuri a sidelong glance, but he seemed oblivious to her epiphany. She wanted to ask him, _is skating the only thing that makes you feel like you’re worth anything? Do you feel like you’re more attached to other people than they are to you? Was Otabek Altin the first real friend you ever had?_ But she continued in silence. Asking him those sorts of questions would only push him away; and besides, she had a good idea what the answers would be.

Otabek was probably the only real friend he had. He cared about Mila, for all that he bitched—she treated him like her little brother, but that was something different from a friend. The rest of his rinkmates were even older, and for all that they undoubtedly loved him, it wasn’t the same. He and Otabek had shared a deep, immediate connection, one that, after a lifetime spent feeling alone, probably felt twice as special.

It was an achingly familiar tune.

_Well, if he really is anything like me, I can cut the bullshit._

“I meant what I said.”

He looked at her. “Huh?”

She hesitated, for a moment. “In Barcelona. I told you I wasn’t trying to keep him from you.”

Yuri’s shoulders had stiffened; about what she had expected, really.

She continued. “I know how you feel. I really do. I know that when people say that, a lot of the time, they don’t really mean it. They’re just trying to get you to see things their way. But I get it. Otabek is…” she shook her head, allowed a fleeting smile. _How do you even begin to describe Otabek Altin?_ “…he’s special. You could search a thousand lifetimes and you’d never find anyone else like him.” She could feel his eyes on her, silently watching. “I know how rare it is to have someone who gets you on that level. There isn’t a day that goes by where I don’t think about how lucky I am.”

Esther turned to face him at last—for a moment, she held green eyes, before he looked quickly away, caught.

“So believe me, when I say I understand. I have no intention of diminishing that, or taking it away from you.” She didn’t have to imagine what her life would be like without him—she’d lived it for almost three years, though the more she thought about it, it didn’t seem much like living at all. She wouldn’t wish it on anyone. “Otabek likes you. He likes being your friend. The one thing I want more than anything in the world is for him to be happy.”

She glanced at Yuri again, but he was looking steadily at his shoes. They stood in silence, while they waited for the stoplight to change, and crossed the street without a word.

Somewhere along the line, something had changed. Esther was fairly certain that she’d gotten through to him, and that his silence was now the product of deep thought, rather than his usual, projected air of disinterest.

She was also fairly certain that she wouldn’t be satisfied with just that.

Neither of them spoke for a long while, each occupied with their own thoughts. _I can’t push him,_ she decided, finally. Fascinating, how it was only when she was willing to leave the past behind that she really started to understand it. _If I come on strong he’s only going to back away. He has to be the one to do this. All I can do is let him know that it’s okay for him to do it._

She expected him to stay quiet all the way back, but he surprised her again. “You’re Jewish.” It wasn’t a question.

“What makes you say so?”

“You wear a _Magen David_ around your neck and you’re always talking to the Israeli skaters. It’s pretty obvious.”

 _Those aren’t words goyim use._ That explained, at least, his reasons for bringing it up.

“I looked for a synagogue to visit, while I was here, but I don’t think there are any in Ostrava. Not anymore, anyway.”

“There’s plenty of places that don’t have a _shul_.”

“True. But, there’s a difference between not finding them in, say, Japan, and not finding them fifteen klicks from the Polish border.” She looked at him, found his eyes were still fixed determinedly ahead. “I just think it’s worth knowing where we came from.”

A long silence. He gave a tight, jerky shrug.

“Do you believe in God?”

“If it weren’t for my _zaide_ I wouldn’t go at all,” he said, gruffly. “Reminds me of my mother.”

Esther faced ahead again, rendered speechless by the extent of her understanding. Deep down, there was nothing she wanted more than to tell him so, to try to convey to him just how much she empathized, but something kept her silent—perhaps it was the fact that, for all he’d revealed to her, he hadn’t answered the question. It wasn’t really her business to know. Hadn’t really been her business to _ask._ If he didn’t want to know her…he was entitled to that.

But he’d gone to the lengths of bringing up something they had in common. That had to count for something.

They reached the hotel at last, went inside and stepped into the elevator. He punched the button for the fifth floor; her, the sixth. Silently, they stood in opposing corners as the cab began to rise.

“You know,” she said, “You can talk to me anytime.”

Yuri turned to give her a searching look, fixed her with piercing green eyes. He seemed on the verge of saying something, when a _ding_ announced their arrival at his stop. He flushed, turned quickly away and darted out the door, mumbling something that might’ve been a goodbye.

Esther leaned back against the rail. The doors closed behind him, and she continued upwards in thoughtful silence.

**Author's Note:**

> There was once a thriving Jewish community in Ostrava; in 1939, there were six synagogues and roughly ten thousand people. In a matter of months, the Nazis destroyed what had grown up over years. Today, the Jewish community in Ostrava is very small. Memorials, in the form of brass plates laid into the pavement outside the former homes of Ostrava Jews, containing the names, birth dates, deportation destinations, and dates of death of the individuals, were sponsored by the Kingston Synagogue of Kingston, England. The Kingston Synagogue also possesses a Sefer Torah from Ostrava, loaned permanently by the Czech Memorial Scrolls Trust.


End file.
